The Chaos Lord Chronicles: Digital Chaos
by The Purple Schnoodle
Summary: The DigiDestined meet a new enemy, and the trio of mages who fight him.
1. Eternity

Okay! This happens after The Digimon Emperor's Revenge, but before anything else really happens. First off, you need to know the basics about a couple of the characters I'm going to be showing ye, because there's no where besides this current fan-fiction that you're likely to have found out about them. Unless you know me or my friends, and have been told about this already, then you can just skip over this part.   
  
A brief (as I can make it) run through:  
  
1. The main, good guys that you'll need to know about are the three Chaos Lords: D'nea, Rahvin and Ae'ros. They have other names, but I'm going to refrain from using them in this fic, as it would cause confusion (and I'm sure it's going to be confusing enough already).   
2. They try and keep their Diadem (a series of worlds, in a system that resembles the layers of an onion. The closer to the center world you get, the stronger magic becomes) from colliding/melding with the other Diadems by simply being present. They don't rule, they're like...plugs. Or, maybe, a safety net. Or, locks. D'nea and Ae'ros travel through the Diadem using Gateways, which look like large holes in the air. Rahvin can teleport, and so she doesn't need to build Gates (Lucky).  
3. Their main enemy is Enime (pronounced "Enemy"), who wants (following the rules of a typical bad guy) to kill the Chaos Lords, take over Chaos (the center world) and rule the Diadem. An all around nasty guy, he has a lot of henchmen, but all you need to know about is Shaidow, his shape shifting-telepathic lackey. Shaidow will be explained in the story.  
4. Each Chaos Lord has their own separate elements. Ex: D'nea controls water, illusion and plant magic. Her portion of the day is the Noon-Afternoon, and she's telekinetic.  
5. The Lords of Chaos (L.O.C.s for short) have a bunch of friends: Min, Avi, Oracle, Jack, and especially Dementia Moonstruck (who has a strong dislike of Carrots, and a love of explosives). These guys will also be explained in the fic.   
  
Alright! Yay! You can continue now, if I haven't scared you off!  
Digimon, etc. belong to whoever created them and the L.O.C.s & Co. belong to me and my dear friends Azzie/Rahvin and Dementia. They cannot belong to Ae'ros, because despite the fact he is our friend, he's still fictional. *G*   
  
  
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June knocked on her brother's door. "Da-vis! Mom says to come and eat your dinner!" There was no response from inside, so she pushed the door open. Davis was slumped on the ground, his head resting on an open textbook. June giggled. He must have fallen asleep in the middle of his homework. Nudging him in the side with her toe, she chimed. "Wake up sleepy head!" June frowned when he didn't respond. In fact...he didn't even seem to be breathing. "D...Davis?" Kneeling down beside him, she held a hand in front of his mouth, but she didn't feel any breath. Staring in shock for a moment, she opened her mouth to scream.  
A hand covered her mouth before she could start. "Shhh...don't worry. This is only temporary."   
June looked up, eyes wide, at a tall, blonde girl, and pried her hand away from her mouth. "B-but...he's dead."  
"Like I said, it's only temporary." Seeing June's bewildered look the girl added, patronizingly, "Just trust me. It'll all turn out fine."  
  
Tai knocked on his sister's door. "Kari? You in there?" When there was no response, so he opened the door. Kari was lying on her side on her bed, Gatomon curled next to her. Both seemed to be asleep, but he couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong. Looking closer, he realized they didn't seem to be breathing. "Kari!"   
"S'alright. She'll be okay."  
Tai spun around to face the girl who stood in the doorway. "What do you mean, she'll be okay?! She's-"  
"It's temporary. My friend is already going to find her and the others and bring them back."  
"What do you mean....wait. The others? Cody, Yolei, Davis, and T.K.? Do you mean to say that they're-"  
"Unfortunately. But, hey, no worries. I have full confidence in D'nea.   
Tai was getting frustrated. "Who's this D'nea? And why is my sister-"  
The girl shook her head. "All you really need to know is that because this evil Mage is being a jerk and involving innocent bystanders in our fight, your sister is as she is."  
"That doesn't explain much."  
The girl shrugged. "Tough. I have a tight schedule right now. I have to go and tell the other families that things are alright. I might have to wipe a few memories or something." Tai started to protest, but she cut him off. "I'll send word to you the second we get them back, alright?"  
"But...hey...wait! Why didn't Gatomon disappear?"  
The girl shrugged. "Dunno." With that, she disappeared.  
Tai looked back at his sister's still form. "What am I going to tell Mom?"  
  
  
D'nea ducked into a small alcove as one of the ghouls that inhabited the fortress of the underworld, dubbed simply "Eternity," turned a corner and floated silently past her hiding place. This place gives me the creeps. The sooner I find the DigiDestined, the sooner I can get out of here. She emerged from her hiding place and nearly slipped on a patch of greenish ooze. And I'm going ta take a nice, long, relaxing bath when I get to back Chaos, that's for sure.   
Actually, the underworld that "Eternity" was located was only the afterlife for a little known dimension. And, it actually was mostly a nice, cheerful place. 99% of the dead population lived in the nicer valleys and plains, and lazed their eternity away in peace and happiness. Only a small number of unlucky souls were kept in "Eternity", most of them the prisoners of Mages who had the power to send them there, or dangerous criminals from the underworld's dimensional counterpart of the living. But this didn't really matter to D'nea at the moment. All she knew was that she was going to give Enime a piece of her mind the next time he showed his face.   
Turning a corner, she ran face to skull into a small possé of warrior skeletons. Backtracking quickly, she ducked into another alcove and sent an illusion running down the corridor, back the way she came. The skeletons opened their jaws in a silent battle cry, and took off after the illusion.   
After they'd left, D'nea breathed a sigh of relief, and hurried on her way.  
  
T.K. woke up, and groaned. "I feel like I've been hit by a truck..." He tried to open his eyes, and suddenly realized he already had them open. He yelped, and sat up, and his head collided with something soft.   
"Ouch!" It yelped. "T.K! Is that you?"   
"Patamon!" As his friend perched on his head, he asked, "Can you see anything?"  
"Nope. I was hoping you could."  
"Well...at least it means that we're probably not blind."  
"Unless we're both blind."  
"Well, aren't you just the ray of sunshine."  
Something moved beside him, and he scrambled to his feet. "Wha...where am I?" wondered a groggy voice.   
T.K. squinted. Now he could almost make out a few shapes, and now he addressed the one that was dragging itself to its feet. "Davis?"  
"Who else is it gonna be? Who's that? T.K?"  
"Someone get the license of the truck that hit me?" wondered a voice at their feet.  
"Veemon?"   
"Present and accounted for," agreed Davis's Digimon partner.  
"Where are the others, then?"  
As if on cue, the other shapes that T.K. could half see, half sense around them stirred and groaned as they woke up. In a few minutes Yolei and Hawkmon, Kari and Gatomon, and Cody and Armadillomon had all been accounted for.  
"Where are we?" Yolei wondered, feeling her way around in the darkness.   
Davis crashed into a wall, and yelped in pain. Kari and the others felt their way over to him. Following the wall that Davis had found they'd discovered another wall and a half before Kari found the door. "I think we're in a cell of some kind," she commented, trying to shove the door open without any luck.  
"Well, the least they could do was give us a window."  
"I don't think they, whoever they are, are real interested in being hospitable."  
There was a depressed silence, which was suddenly interrupted by a soft moan behind them, and the soft rustle of cloth on stone.  
They strained their eyes to try and see who (or what) was there, but it was next to impossible. "Who's there?" Gatomon inquired, finding Kari and positioning herself between her DigiDestined friend and the sound.  
"Gatomon?" Whoever it was sounded like they were getting to their feet, and Kari thought she could see a shadow move.  
Gatomon gasped. It wasn't....it couldn't be..."Wizardmon?" Skittering forward, she found her friend's hand and grabbed it. "How'd you get here?"  
"I was about to ask you the same thing..." He sounded worried.  
"What is it?"  
"Well...this place, as far as I can tell, is something of an...afterlife."  
T.K. finished the thought for him. "So if we're here....we must be dead?"  
The statement brought on pandemonium.  
"I'm to young to die!"  
"I'm going to miss all my soaps!"  
"What am I going to tell my parents?!"  
"Quiet!" Kari suddenly yelped. She had one ear pressed up against the door, and, after a few moments of listening, she gasped. "Someone's coming!"  
"Are you sure?"  
"Positive."  
"Only fools are-"  
"Don't start."  
Then suddenly they could all hear the sound of hurried footsteps. They listened as the sound got louder, until it stopped right in front of the door. There was a moment's pause, and then a slight knock, accompanied by a muffled "Hello?"  
Davis lunged for the door, and pounded back on it. "Hey! Let us-"  
He was pushed away by Cody, who addressed the voice on the other side of the door. "Hello! Can you help us?"  
"Are you the DigiDestined?"  
"Yeah, that's us. Who wants to know?"  
"Questions later, let me get this door open. Step out of the way, please." A small, square patch next to Cody suddenly started to glow with a soft violet light. The DigiDestined and their friends backed away quickly as the glow became stronger. Then, quite suddenly, there was a yelp and the glow disappeared. "Curse it! Curse it curse it curse it!!!" The door blew open, and disintegrated, letting some dim light into the cell. A short-ish girl was silhouetted in the doorway, and she held out a palm. A small ball of lavender light appeared above it and lit up her face, which held a "Guess I showed that door who was boss!" expression.   
"Who are you?" Davis yelped.  
"D'nea. And this is a jailbreak." She frowned a little and glanced at the cell. "In a manner of speaking."  
"But-"  
D'nea shook her head. "I'll explain as we go. But we don't have a bunch of time. If Enime didn't already know I was here, he does now."  
"You've lost me," T.K. shook his head.  
"I said I'll explain. If we could go now?"  
"How do we know we can trust you, anyway?" Davis asked, glaring.  
D'nea backed up a pace and spread her arms with a hurt expression, while the small ball of light floated where she left it. "I'm getting you people out of Eternity, here! You can decide weather or not to trust me later, but I for one don't want to stay here any longer than I have to."  
The DigiDestined looked at each other, and then one by one they nodded. "What have we got to lose, anyway?" Kari pointed out.   
A few minutes later they were hurrying down a labyrinth like set of passages, and everyone had questions, which D'nea was trying to answer the best she could.  
"So, who are you anyway? And why are you helping us?"  
"I already told you. I'm D'nea. One of the three Chaos Lords. I'm helping you because it's partially our fault you're in this mess." She paused to peer around a corner. Seeing the next passageway was empty, she nodded and led them down it. The DigiDestined waited for her to continue. "See, not to long ago, our friend Ae'ros was kidnapped by an evil Mage named Enime, and I already know how ironic that name is, thank you very much. Anyhow, he then captured my friend Dementia Moonstruck, converted her to data and scattered her pixels across the digital world. Then, to make matters worse, he sent us a challenge, and told us he was going to capture you people and hide you somewhere. If we couldn't find you in a specific time limit, he'd get to keep you. Which means it would have been even harder to find Dementia."  
"Oooookay.....so what are Chaos Lords, then?"  
"We live on Castle Chaos, on Chaos, in the center of the Diadem. Think 'Universal Onion'. Each layer of the 'Onion' contains hundreds of hundreds of worlds, except for the center, which is simply a world of its own. That's Chaos. As you go deeper through the levels, the stronger magic becomes. The Chaos Lords keep this Diadem from colliding with the other Diadems, because many of the worlds are very similar to worlds in other Diadems, and they want to meld. Our job is pretty much to add some element of chaos into these worlds and give them some variations so they're not so much alike."  
"And Enime? Is he a Chaos Lord?"  
"Blasphemed!" D'nea shuddered. "I don't even want to think about that scenario." Shaking her head, and leading them down another passage way, she added, "He's the exact opposite of us. He's logical, arrogant, self-centered, and bad to the bone."  
A voice cackled from behind them. "And he's found you."  
They spun around. A purple-black blob with a vaguely humanoid shape leered at them through a jagged gash that it used for a mouth. D'nea scowled. "Shaidow!"   
"In the flesh. So nice to see you again, D'nea," As it spoke, two fiery eyes appeared in it's face, and claws resembling Wolverine's slid out of it's hands.  
D'nea answered by pulling power. A torrent of water cascaded down onto the shape shifter, and froze into a large block of ice. Turning away, she hurried them forward. "That won't hold it long, so we'll have to put a lot of distance between it and us. Hurry!"  
"That was Enime?" Wizardmon asked as they hurried. D'nea shook her head.   
"That was Shaidow, one of his henchmen. It's a shape shifter, and a telepath. A really nasty combination, that. It means it can find out what could most hurt you, and then change into that thing. And he's practically unstoppable, which doesn't help much." There was a glimmer of sunlight, and D'nea pointed ahead. "There we go! The exit!"   
The words were barely out of her mouth when evil laugher echoed around them. D'nea groaned, and broke into a run. The DigiDestined followed suit.   
The sunlight momentarily blinded them when they scrambled out the door. "Look out for the three-headed dog!" D'nea yelped, and pushed them forward. Behind them they heard the rattle of a large chain, and three canine snarls. A glance behind them showed a very large dog, with three heads full of very white, very sharp teeth. Behind them stood a figure that seemed to be made of darkness. D'nea pointed forward into the forest that rose out in front of them, where a path wound through the trees. "Follow that, until you come to a clearing with a crystal embedded in a large rock! Gather around the crystal and grab each other's hands, then wait for me. I don't think Rahvin will leave anyone out, but it's better to take a few precautions. Go!" She stopped and turned to face her foe.  
It felt like they ran for ages, hearing the occasional yell, followed by an explosion of either sound or light. It had been a few minutes since the last explosion when at last they came to a clearing, with a large, white crystal in the very middle. The DigiDestined and their friends gathered around and held hands. D'nea came running after them, and as soon as she reached them, she put her hand on the crystal, yelling, "Rahvin! Now!"   
A dark ball of energy zoomed through the air to bury itself in her back. The Chaos Lord screamed as the world suddenly disappeared around them, to be replaced by a brilliant light. Kari noticed it managed to look white, while looking purple, green and blue at the same time. *It's making my eyes hurt...* "D'nea, are you alright?"  
"Y...yeah." She sounded dazed, but unhurt. The others chimed in, confirming that they were also okay.  
Satisfied her friends were safe for now, she was just about to ask someone what was going on, when the ground that they couldn't see dropped out from under their feet and they fell...a total of two feet, three and 1/4 inches.  
"Ouch!"  
"Yeow!"  
"Argh! Ooooh, I think I just landed on my Digivice..."   
Then everything went black.   
  
When she woke up, Yolei felt as if she were one, big ache. The others' mixed moans and groans told her that they were awake also, and probably in the same condition. They picked themselves up, looking around in confusion. D'nea was nowhere to be seen.   
Davis was gaping. "Where are we?"  
"I think we must be at that Castle Chaos that D'nea was talking about. You know, where the Chaos Lords lived."  
Veemon whistled softly. "This is some place they got here!"  
They stood in the middle of a large hall. The walls were of gray stone, and there were various hanging on the walls. There was a large, circular table in front of them, in the middle of the room, and a large chandelier, light with candles, hung over it. They looked around, but they seemed to be alone.   
A brown-and black tabby cat hurtled past them, nearly colliding with Kari's legs, but scrabbling to one side just in time. -'Scuse me! Comin'' through! Outta th' way! Innocent bystander running for her dear little life!- A voice rang in their heads as the cat passed them. It barely slowed down until it reached the table, where it crouched beneath a chair, it's tail bushed up and it's eyes wide.  
"Did that cat just talk?" Yolei gasped.   
"Watch out! Comin' through!"   
The group spun around just as a small, blond haired girl followed the path of the cat. She carried a large sword but, while it looked heavy, she carried its weight easily. She leapt onto the table, and turned to face them, her sword up in "guard" position. Gatomon and the other Digimon stepped in front of their partners, ready to fight to protect them. But the girl didn't seem to be interested in them.  
A war cry sounded behind them, and they scrambled out of the way as an older blond pursued the smaller one. "Ha! Avi! You cannot escape my wrath! Etc. etc. etc!!!" She leapt up on the table, and swung her own sword. The smaller girl, who they supposed was Avi, ducked and lunged in with her own sword.  
"That's what you think! Take that, Rahvin!"  
The older girl, Rahvin, blocked the blow and laughed. "Oh please! That was the first move I learned! Try this on for size!" She slid her own blade up Avi's sword, aiming for her neck. Avi flung her sword off the table, dropped and rolled after it. Rahvin's sword dug into the wood of the table, and she struggled a moment or two to free her blade. During that time, Avi had retrieved her own blade. She spun around, her blade up, and just in time to block Rahvin's blow. They locked blades, and strained against each other, teeth bared in determined grimaces. But gradually, because of her advantage of height, Rahvin began to win. Avi was forced backwards, until she suddenly tripped over one of the flagstones of the floor. She shrieked and landed flat on her back, her sword flying out of her grip and clattering across the room. Rahvin smirked, the tip of her blade just touching Avi's chest. "Ha!" And with that, she thrust down with her blade.  
Depending on their natures, the DigiDestined gasped, or looked away. But there was no spray of blood, and no scream of pain from Avi. Instead, there was just a sigh of frustration. "Aw man! I thought I had you this time!"  
They looked up, confused. Avi, still with the blade pinning her like a bug to the ground, was frowning up at Rahvin, who was leaning on said blade and smiling patronizingly. "Hey, cheer up Avi. You're definitely getting better. If you hadn't nearly tripped over Chris you might have got me back there on the stairs."   
"Sure. Says you, Miss Best-Swordsperson-in-the-Entire-Diadem-Without-Even-Practicing-Because-My-Former-Selves-Learned-It-All," Avi muttered, and tapped the blade. "Can I get up, now?"  
Rahvin stepped back and tapped the blade herself. The sword disappeared, and suddenly looked up at the stunned DigiDestined. "Oh! You're awake!" She grinned at them. "Feeling better? Less dead, maybe?"  
Yolei wasn't sure about the others, but she was a little speechless. "Uh..."  
The tabby was obviously feeling calmer, because it hopped up onto the tabletop and began nonchalantly washing a paw. -Rahvin, you really need to work on your people skills.-  
Rahvin frowned. "What I say?"  
-You just stabbed your cousin through the chest, and then asked if your guests felt "less dead." Biiiiig social no-no's.-  
"Liar." D'nea's voice commented from behind them.   
"D'nea!"   
She rubbed her ear and wobbled over to the table. "Yes. It's me. Give me a moment, though, please? I'm just not a morning person." She slumped into a chair, which immediately turned into a large, purple, plush recliner. A mug appeared in front of her, and she tapped it. "Cappuccino." When nothing happened, she rolled her eyes. "Please."   
The mug filled, and she took a sip. And made a face. "Excuse moi! This isn't cappuccino!"   
Rahvin avoided her friends eyes. "Uhh...I kinda already drank it all."  
"All of it?"  
"Uh-huh."  
"And that was like, what, three coffee pots full?"  
"Uh...yep."  
D'nea appealed to the heavens. "I'm living in a nightmare!"  
Gatomon cleared her throat pointedly. "Are we invisible, or something?"  
D'nea, glowering at the mug, shrugged. "I doubt it. I could arrange that for you, if you'd like."  
"That's not what I meant."  
Rahvin rolled her eyes at her friend and turned to the DigiDestined. "Don't mind her. She's not a morning person. Neither am I, really, unless I've had coffee." She ignored D'nea's glare, and continued. "Actually, now that I think about it, Ae'ros is the only one who's a morning person around here, and Enime has him."  
-Which takes us to the reason you people are here, which is probably what you wanted to know in the first place. Don't mind them. This is normal. Uh...well...as normal as these guys are gonna get.- The cat padded over to D'nea's mug and sniffed at it.  
"Look who's talking, Chris," D'nea retorted, pulling the mug away from the cat's inquisitive nose.  
-Okay, so I'm a telepathic talking cat. It does not mean that I can't be normal.-  
"Whatever." She leaned over, and stage whispered confidentially. "She sings. Annoying little ditties. And show tunes. Twenty three hours a day. The rest of the time she sleeps."  
-Liar! It's only twenty two hours.- Chris looked indignant, and appealed to the kids. -See what I have to put up with?-  
Avi, who had disappeared through a doorway, suddenly materialized behind D'nea's chair, and set a big glass of some dark liquid in front of her. "Here you go. Barqs. I thought you could use the caffeine.  
D'nea nodded her thanks, already gulping root beer.  
"Can we get back to why we're here?" T.K. asked, pointedly.  
-They have short attention spans,- agreed Chris, nodding. -You're here, because Rahvin teleported you from that afterlife-dimension back to here. Mind you, if you die the usual way, we can't actually bring you back. It was just that the afterlife that you were in wasn't one that you belonged in. You were in that dimension, because Enime, their greatest enemy, was being a jerk.-  
"We know that part already," Davis interjected. "But why was he going after us? What'd we ever do to him?"  
"He was going after you, because we were going to get your help to try and find Dementia," Rahvin, who seemed to have lapsed into a brief period of calm, answered.  
"She's the one that got changed into data, and scattered, right?" Yolei asked.  
Rahvin nodded.  
"So why'd he scatter her?" Cody wondered.  
-Because he's a cruel, evil, power-hungry mage who wants to take over Chaos?-  
Rahvin tweaked the cat's tail. "Because she's the one who usually bails us out when he's captured one of us. See, Dem's one of the only ones who could probably totally destroy Enime. Even I couldn't do it alone. D'nea, Ae'ros, and I, we wouldn't stand a chance if we faced him one on one."  
"But D'nea did, back on that world you rescued us from," Kari pointed out.  
D'nea finished her root beer, and put the glass down. "That was because he was drained from bringing you there. Also, we were both low on power, because that dimension mutes magic."  
"But you blew up a door."  
Rahvin's eyes grew wide, and she whirled on D'nea. "You blew up a door?!"  
D'nea looked sheepish, and stared intently at her mug. "It was evil," she muttered, like that was an explanation. Rahvin tapped her foot, wearing an expression that meant she definitely wanted some elaboration. D'nea sighed. "The lock had a backlash on it, so no one could pick it."  
"Even with magic?"  
"Especially with magic." D'nea shrugged. "I got a little mad. That place was wreaking havoc on my emotions."  
"And then you took on Enime? No wonder you were tired!"   
D'nea grinned nonchalantly. "Yeah, well...I'm feeling much better now."  
"What about that thing he hit you with, before we came here?" Kari asked. She couldn't help but get the feeling the Chaos Lord was lying through her teeth. "It looked like a ball of black lightning."  
D'nea suddenly looked very uncomfortable. "Uhh..."  
Rahvin narrowed her eyes, and scowled at D'nea. "He hit you with a spell?"  
"Um..."   
"D'nea!" Rahvin scowl increased. "What spell did he hit you with?!"  
"Dunno." It was a lie, and all the DigiDestined could see it. Rahvin opened her mouth to interrogate her friend further, when D'nea coughed. And coughed again. After the third cough, she managed to gasp in a breath of air, and muttered "Shoot" before she collapsed into a full-fledged coughing fit.   
"Sh**t," Rahvin corrected. "D'nea! When were you going to tell me about this?!"  
"Uh...when we..." She coughed, and grabbed the glass, which was suddenly filled with water. Taking a few gulps, she continued. "When we found Ae'ros and defeated Enime?"  
"D'nea!" Rahvin scowled furiously. "Open up. Right now."  
D'nea sighed, and closed her eyes. A second later, all her details had disappeared. She was a humanoid figure made up of purple light, or perhaps energy. In the center of her chest was a brilliant white glow. The DigiDestined gasped.  
"What's she doing?" T.K. gaped.  
"It's her essence," Rahvin explained, still scowling.   
"It looks like she's digivolving," commented Kari.  
This got an echoing giggle from D'nea. "D'nea digivolve toooo...." Her voice echoed as she spoke, the same way the Digimon did when they digivolved.   
"...In-giganticaly-big-trouble-mon." Rahvin supplied. "Hold up your hands...what's that on them?"  
D'nea held out her hands. Tendrils of black were very, very slowly winding around them, and starting down her arms. Rahvin frowned. "And there's some on your neck, too."  
"And my head. Or, there should be. I've a major headache right now."  
Rahvin kicked one of the chairs. "I'm gonna kill him!"  
"What?" The DigiDestined burst out, simultaneously.  
"He's @#*! poisoning her with his @#*! magic!!!"  
  
To be continued...  
  
Mwee hee hee...y'like so far? Anyhow, more's coming.   
  



	2. The Plot Thickens

_First, a small dedication: To Catherine, our dear Dementia Moonstruck. Thanks for your help, I couldn't ask for a better beta reader, or muse! _

And, at last I get the hang of this formatting thing! 

News flash! I'm doing it a bit differently this time...different POVs. First section's T.K.'s. Enjoy!

Chaos ensued. Everyone started talking at once, and my head was swimming with questions. _*Poisoning her with his magic? And I thought the Digital World was strange!*_

D'nea hid her essence, returning to the way she looked before. I glanced over at Patamon and he nodded. It wasn't just me: D'nea looked tired and, most of all, afraid. My friends kept trying to get some answers, while Rahvin looked worried and furious at the same time.

"I'll be up in my room," D'nea stated and, standing, headed to one side of the Great Hall, where three doors stood, each marked with either an "A", an "R", or a "D". The door marked "D" (_*D for D'nea?* _I guessed) slid open when she approached it, and 

stepped inside. I caught a glimpse of lavender-tinted glass, and D'nea pushing a button on the other side, before the doors slid shut again. 

"You have elevators?" Davis commented, after a few moments of somewhat stunned silence.

"Do you have phones, too? I really should be contacting Tai. I'll bet Mom's worried sick," Kari added.

Avi grinned brightly. "We have something better. Rahvin, snap out of it and set these guys up a communication spell."

I looked over at Rahvin, who was glaring at the ground in front of her, deep in thought. Avi cleared her throat, and Rahvin looked up. "What?"

"Set them up a communication spell!"

"Oh..." Turning to me, Rahvin asked, "What's the location?"

"What?" I responded, hoping she'd elaborate.

"The location! You know. That you're trying to contact?" She said it like it was obvious, and I felt a little embarrassed. 

Trying to make up for it, I responded (looking like I did this sort of thing all the time) "Oh...my mom, I guess."

Rahvin looked frustrated, and retorted flatly, "You're mother is not a location."

"Er, our apartment, I mean." Second goof up. This magic stuff was getting me whacked out. Wizardmon, however, was soaking it all up; maybe it was a magician thing. I saw Gatomon, Chris, and Wizardmon deep in conversation, and I could just barely make out Chris's voice, a steady buzz in the back of my mind. 

Rahvin seemed to be waiting for me to continue, and I blinked. "What?"

"Elaborate, please."

"Oh!" _*Strike three...I'm never going to get the hang of this.* _I quickly gave her the street address of the apartment building, and the apartment number. Rahvin frowned in concentration, and held her palms parallel to each other. A forest green ball of light swirled between them, and as it grew, Rahvin repeated the address. The ball of light suddenly grew about plate-sized, and just as flat. And, quite suddenly, my mom's face appeared in it. She shrieked, and then, seeing my face, shrieked again. "T.K.!"

_*Oh boy...here we go...* _"Hi, Mom."

"You were...you were..." Mom looked like she'd just seen a ghost. Then again, I guess she technically did.

"Dead? Yeah...but I'm not now." 

Chris yawned, somewhere behind him. _-Oh, yeah, like that's reassuring.-_ Rahvin shushed her. I had to agree, but I didn't know what else to tell her. It's not something that they usually cover in school.

"This blonde girl came, and said they were taking care of it...and then you disappeared...Could you please explain what's going on?!"

I winced. *She's survived Myotismon's attack, and finding out about the Digital World. This wont be too hard. I hope.* "It's...kind of a long story."

***

I edged the other DigiDestined away while T.K. tried to explain and calm down his mother at the same time. "Who's next?" I asked. "Kari?" Kari shrugged, and gave me her address. I closed my eyes, and concentrated. Using magic came naturally to me. Of course, it came naturally to all of us, here on Chaos, but that's beside the point. Focusing my energy, I reached through the boundaries between the worlds, and sent a bit of awareness out to their Earth. Zooming along streets, I muttered the address again, to make sure I remembered it. Finding the right place, I found the nearest contact, make a temporary anchor, and completed the spell. All this occurred in a manner of seconds.

I opened my eyes to see the boy called Tai's face in the communication spell's window. Leaving Kari to talk to her brother, I went about setting up communication spells for the rest of the DigiDestined, and left them to explain, calm, and comfort their families.

Going over to the elevators, I took the one up to D'nea's quarters. I found her in 

her garden. Being a plant mage, D'nea had used her magic to create and help maintain the numerous flowers, ferns, ivy, bonsai trees, and other miscellaneous plants that grew there. And throughout the garden was a network of fountains, waterfalls, and streams, that all eventually led back to the pool in the middle. Sometimes, when she thought about it, D'nea used the pool to scry with, but we hadn't used it recently for anything really important. Besides, it had the tendency to be somewhat temperamental.

D'nea was perched beside the pool, her feet dangling in the water. Aiiya, her sphinx familiar and the first familiar we'd met when we first discovered that we were Chaos Lords, was stretched out behind her, and D'nea was leaning against Aiiya's side.

"Why didn't you tell me?" I demanded, coming over and sitting next to her.

She wasn't startled at my sudden appearance, but that didn't surprise me. We joked a lot that we were on the same brainwave, and we could usually tell when the other was nearby. 

"Because..." D'nea stared at her feet and sent ripples across the water with her magic, making patterns with them. "...I was afraid. And...I figured you would make me stay here, while you went out looking for Ae'ros and Dem."

"Well, you're right, I am." I continued before she could protest. "What if you get worse, while we're searching? We have to find Dem and Ae'ros, and if you get really sick we might not be able to find them in time." _-And I don't want to lose both of you.-_ I added, through our mind-link. Too bad we couldn't reach Ae'ros through it.

D'nea scowled. "So I stay here, while you're off risking your life for our friends?" She knew I was right, but couldn't help feeling guilty.

I hugged her. "Hey, it'll be okay. I'll tell you the moment we find Enime. And if I get in trouble, I'll just yell and you can pop right on over there." 

D'nea hugged me back, and coughed. "I'm gonna kill him," she told me, more angry than I was used to her being. But it suddenly passed, and turned into curiosity as something occurred to her. "Out of curiosity, why do you suppose Enime always takes Ae'ros first?"

"His fatal flaw that will lead to his downfall?"

A grin threatened to appear on her face. "Then why haven't we beaten him yet?"

"Good point. I dunno...maybe he finds Ae'ros as a better target?"

A communication spell, with Avi's trademark red magic on it, opened up in front of us. "They're done, and a couple of them want you to set up another spell for them."

"Why don't you do it, Avi?" I pointed out. "It'll be good practice." Avi was getting a real knack with spells, but since she'd started later than we did, she couldn't do quite as many things.

"Because you know I can't do inter-dimensional communication spells." Avi pulled a face at me.

Aiiya yawned, and stood up. "You might as well go back down. There must be oodles of things to tie up, sending them home and all."

D'nea frowned, and I could almost see the little light bulb go off over her head. "We can't send them home."

I stared at her. "What? Why?"

"Because Enime will just kidnap them again. At least, what's to stop him?"

_-Good point, Chi,-_ I grumbled, frowning at this new dilemma, and suddenly realized that the communication spell with Avi was still up. My cousin shrugged. "Come down, and we'll figure it all out, alright?"

***

Meeting downstairs again, and taking a moment to introduce Aiiya to the kids and Digimon, I explained the new dilemma.

"We couldn't go home anyway," replied Kari, her grin matching the rest of the DigiDestined's. Rahvin and I blinked in confusion. Kari elaborated. "After all, the whole reason D'nea's in trouble is because she had to come and rescue us."

"One good turn deserves another," Gatomon added.

"But..." Rahvin spluttered.

"But..." I agreed.

"But nothing. And better yet, if you'll set up a few more of those communication thingies, we can contact the older kids," Davis pointed out. "I'll bet they help out, too."

"Yeah! And, Joe's studying to be a doctor! I'll bet he could help with D'nea's problem!" Yolei piped up.

"But..."

"But..."

"Just accept our help," Wizardmon suggested.

Rahvin and I looked at each other, sighed simultaneously, and shrugged. "It can't hurt, I guess," Rahvin decided, hesitantly.

"Of course not. And besides, if you're going to be looking for your friends in the Digital World you'll need our help anyway," Cody told us, speaking up for the first time. He'd seemed busy earlier, studying the Great Hall with a measuring eye. "And the older DigiDestined will be a big help with that, too."

I nodded, and the itch that signaled a coughing fit returned. Through coughs, I called up a glass of water, minus the glass. It's lack of a container didn't faze me, and I grabbed it, trying to sooth the itch with it. While I was doing this, Chris padded over to us and yowled. _-Enough yapping, let's get with it!_-

***

After a few hurried "calls" around, they'd finally located all of the original DigiDestined. Rahvin set up the spells in a circle, so Tai, Matt, Sora, Mimi, Joe and Izzy could see each other as well as us Chaos Lords and the new DigiDestined. Matt and Tai were visibly relieved to have Kari and T.K. back and breathing again, Sora, Joe, Izzy, and Mimi were a little ticked that Tai and Matt hadn't told them about it, and they all were startled to see Wizardmon. At last, though, T.K. and the others explained what was going on.

"So you need our help?" Joe, craned his neck, trying to see me. I realized I was standing just out of his line of sight. 

Sidestepped so he could see me I shrugged. "They said you could help us."

"Not," Rahvin added, hurriedly, "that we can't take care of this ourselves."

I nodded, agreeing wholeheartedly, and continuing. "It's just it would be a lot easier with your help."

"Exactly." We nodded at each other. 

The DigiDestined, new and old, tried their best to hide their grins, and we pretended not to notice them. "You did save our friends," Tai told them. "The least we can do is help you save yours."

"True."

"Alright then." Rahvin rubbed her hands together. "A quick teleportation spell, and you'll all be here in a jiffy."

"Wait!" Joe yelped. "Let me get some stuff first!" His face disappeared from his "window."

"Just let me get my laptop," Izzy told Rahvin, and he, too, disappeared. Mimi quickly followed suit, giving an quick explanation involving make-up and her hat.

"Well, I'm ready. Beam me up, Scotty!" Tai grinned. 

Rahvin winced. "Ouch. Alright, one teleportation, coming up." The communication disappeared, and Tai suddenly stood in its place. 

"Whoa! Talk about fast transportation!"

A few moments later, Matt and Sora also were there, and Izzy had returned. "Alright. Beam me u-"

"That joke's been used." 

"Darn it."

***

The new and old DigiDestined, their Digimon friends, the Chaos Lords, and a small assortment of their friends gathered around the large table in the center of the great hall. The table had become round, so they could all see each other without being left out. D'nea started to introduce one of the newcomers, but suddenly broke down into a coughing fit, so Rahvin had to take over for her. "That's Min," she explained, gesturing towards me, and I took a little pleasure at the startled expressions on both the humans and the digimons faces. After all, I'll admit I'm somewhat striking when you first meet me. I've been told I look like "a living Ying-Yang." I'm still trying to decide if this is a compliment or not. To be more specific, I am split in half, my right side is a beautiful ebony black, down to the smallest detail. And the left side the same, only a brilliant snow white. My sword hangs at my side, and it was also split down the middle in a similar fashion. "She's a chaos being, one that our former self created."

"Created?" One of the DigiDestined, the one they'd called Yolei frowned, and I picked up a faint idea from her: This sounds a little like Ken and Kimeramon.

The human called Izzy had, however, picked up on something else. "Former _self_?" 

I smirked.

Rahvin sighed. "Long story there. I'll explain later." 

D'nea's coughing fit subsided, and she wore a scowl. "Can we get started? The sooner we find Dem, the sooner we find Enime, and the sooner I can punch his face in."

"Who's Dem?" Another boy, supposedly one of the older DigiDestined, called "Matt" asked.

"Dementia Moonstruck," D'nea answered. 

_-Borderline! Borderline! Borderline!- _Chris hopped up onto D'nea's shoulders, who rubbed the cat's chin, and continued. I grinned. Dementia had added that last part to her name, after one run in with Enime.

"She...uh...has a thing against Carrots, and an obsession with explosives. She also has a floating volleyball minion. Not to mention an umbrella named Schnookums."

I bit back the urge to point out the obvious, only because someone else was about to for me. "That doesn't help."

"Um...she's, like, _the_ original Chaos Being," D'nea explained, and I fought back a wave of jealousy. 

The Digimon introduced as Wizardmon turned just a little paler, and made an odd choking sound. "The one who has various religious sects popping up and worshipping her? The one who half a cell block in Eternity was setting up the cult about?"

Rahvin and D'nea winced simultaneously. "Um...we haven't heard as much, but it's pretty likely. She seems to have that effect on people."

"Actually," I spoke up, "She usually has them running in terror. Though, they have occasionally 

D'nea tried to continue her explanation. "Dementia's probably the only Chaos Being we didn't create. In fact, there's only three Chaos Beings that we know of, and Min and Ego were created by us."

"You've...lost me. Totally and completely."

D'nea winced. "Erm...okay, Dementia is the one who usually bails us out, because her natural chaotic and lunatic-ness wreaks havoc with Enime's logic. And so, he's got to her first, before she can help us out. And, we're hoping, she knows where he is, thus we could find Enime when we find Dementia. And wherever Enime is Ae'ros is probably somewhere nearby. And once we find him, it'll be no problem royally kicking Enime's-"

"D'nea!"

"-arse."

Another of the older DigiDestined, this one a boy named "Tai," tried to take control of the situation. "Alright then. So, we all go searching the Digital World until we find this Dementia person."

"It'll be harder than it sounds. She's a handful of scattered pixels right now," Rahvin pointed out. "And besides, we're not all going?"

"What?" 

D'nea suddenly looked sullen. Rahvin continued. "D'nea's staying here. I'm not going to take the chance that she'll get any sicker."

"I'll stay here with her," The girl called Kari volunteered. 

"If Kari's staying, then me an' Veemon will, too," A boy introduced to me as "Davis" piped up immediately, before Kari's Digimon friend, Gatomon, could volunteer also. I pondered potential emotional tensions going on. 

"Ditto," the cat Digimon added.

"I'll stay, also." Wizardmon volunteered.

The "pre-doctor" boy, Joe, looked almost relieved. "And I'll stay, too. It'll be good practice, if she does get any worse."

D'nea made a face. "Glad someone will be enjoying this."

Rahvin nodded. "Alright. The rest of us will search for Dementia. D'nea, if anything happens just tell me, alright?"

D'nea nodded. At the confused looks of the humans and Digimon, she explained. "We're mind-linked. It's one of the perks of being a Chaos Lord. We usually can sense Ae'ros, too, but he's either stone or, maybe, reverted into his essence, or..."

"Okay, okay!" I interrupted. "I know you could go on all day. When do we head out?"

"How's now sound?" Rahvin suggested.

"Good for me." I grinned, if a little manically.

***

The English teacher, dubbed Herr Huke by some of his less sane students, sat in one corner of the large-ish cell, trying to grade papers while blocking out the noise made by the chanting prisoners who occupied the same cell as he did. It didn't help that the one they were chanting about (or to. He couldn't figure out which one) was one of his former students. It also didn't help that one of her old papers happened to float to the surface of his grading stack. He didn't realize until he was half way through that he was reading Paris's formal lawsuit against the characters of Romeo and Juliet until it was too late. 

Resisting the urge to throw the red grading pen across the room, Dementia's ninth grade English teacher took a few moments to deep breath, calm down, and try to smite something. Millions of miles away, across the fabric of time and space, a lightning bolt came out of no where and struck an innocent particle of dust. However, since Herr Huke was oblivious to this, he couldn't get any satisfaction from it.

Flipping to the next paper, he read it through, and then scrawled the grade and a small note beside it. "A. Because, despite the fact that I'm being held captive in the same cell as a bunch of loonies who are worshipping one of my former students, I must rise above the need to make others as miserable as I am right now. Nice paper. Well written." 

"D. Because the paper is lacking something, and thus is grinding my nerves at this totally inopportune time. Rewrite this later, when I'm no longer trapped in some afterworld prison, and I'll give you more credit."

The chanting grew louder. Herr Huke tried humming a few Lorena McKennet songs, trying to drown out the chanting and, when that didn't work, started singing all her CDs, in alphabetical order. It worked only because of the fact some of the chanters heard him, and started singing along. Soon the whole group were listening, and belting out the choruses with him.

And so, Herr Huke gave up trying to grade papers and began to direct the prisoners in a chorus of "Green sleeves", oblivious to the presence of a small, pixie-shaped handful of pixels, which flittered above him.

***

"Ken...I think we're lost."

I stopped and looked around. I had to agree. "I think you're right. But, how can we be? I thought I knew the Digital World like the back of my hand!"

Wormon wiggled his front feet in a shrug. "Maybe we could ask someone for directions?"

I shook my head, and sighed. "Like anyone would help me. I was the Digimon Emperor, remember? They all hate me."

"They just don't know you. Who could _not_ like you, Ken?"

Before I could answer, piercing squeals reached my ears. Wormon and I exchanged looks, and ran towards the direction of the sound. Stumbling through some bushes, we came into a clearing where a small group of baby Digimon were clustered together, squeaking in terror. In front of them stood a semi-transparent....Darth Vader?!

"Hey!" I yelled, trying to figure out what was going on. "Why don't you pick on someone your own size!"

Darth Vader turned to look at me, and disintergrated. His pixels scattered, and then grouped again, to form a large, blue golf umbrella, which waved at me threateningly. I blinked, and shrugged. Well, Darth Vader or blue golf umbrella, those Digimon looked terrified and I wasn't going to let anything happen to them. "Wormon, Digivolve!" I held out my digivice, and Wormon started to glow. 

The umbrella positioned itself between me and the Digimon babies, opening and closing with sharp, snapping sounds. The little Digimon were squeaking, and trying to hide behind the umbrella. A light bulb flickered on in my brain. "Wormon! Wait!" He stopped glowing, and looked at me like I was crazy.

The umbrella vanished, and the words "Grrrrrr..." appeared where it had been.

"See? It's just trying to protect them."

The words disappeared, to be replaced with new once, "It? Excuse me? _It?!_ I am woman, hear me roar, thank you!"

"Hey, I'm sorry. But, you were an umbrella a few seconds ago."

The pixels re-arranged themselves into a reply. "So? Are you saying that umbrellas cant have genders? Just wait 'till I find Schnookums!"

"*Look*. I'm sorry, alright? I thought you were attacking those baby Digimon."

"Well, I wasn't. I was teaching them of the great works of Star Wars. So nyah."

I was beginning to question the sanity of this person. Pixels. Whatever. Wormon blinked at her. "What's Star Wars?"

The words suddenly became a small, transparent TV screen. On it, Episode 1's trailer flickered across it, and then switched to brief summaries of the last three Episodes. After this, the screen disappeared, and the words "Any more questions?" appeared where it had been.

My partner blinked a few times. "No."

I had one, though. "Who are you, anyway?"

"Dementia Moonstruck!" Below this, in smaller letters, was the words "Borderline! Borderline! Borderline!" Inside joke? Maybe...

"I'm Ken."

There was a pause, and then she responded. "The Digimon Emperor?"

My spirits sank. Was that going to follow me everywhere? Probably.... "Yeah."

"Cool!"

Both Wormon and I were taken aback. "What?"

"You heard me. You haven't had much experience with explosives, though, have you? Like...any current access to them?" Despite the fact they were words made of pixels, I detected a hopeful tone to them. Maybe it was the image of a begging puppy hovering around the L and the question mark.

"Not...really." I didn't remember blowing anything up...usually it was the other kids who did that, and usually it was one of the control spires. 

The words "Sigh" appeared, and then a pair of arms appeared, and shrugged. "Oh well. You'll tell me if you get some, though, right?"

I wasn't sure if that was a good idea, but since I never counted on getting any explosives, I didn't think it would hurt. "Uh...sure."

The baby Digimon, tired of being ignored, simultaneously burst into a chorus of tiny wails. "Ack!" Dementia wrote, and her pixels zipped down to them and made little spirals in the air, with small explosions of color. The babies stopped their cries, and "ooh"ed at the display.

"Where'd they come from, anyway?"

"Dunno. They're lost."

Wormon scuttled over to the babies. "Then we should get them home, shouldn't we? Maybe they live in Primary Village."

The little creatures nodded, with a chorus of "Yep!"

A small, pouting face appeared, with more words. "I'm lost too."

"You're in the Digital World..."

The answer appeared before I could finish. "I know _that_. But I'm really, totally and completely _lost_!"

"Well, so are Wormon and I."

"But _you_ haven't lost _your_ body!" came the heated reply, with small, see-through flames on either side of the words.

I winced. "Oh...that's what you mean."

"Duh."

Wormon scrambled over to me. "We can help! Can't we, Ken?"

The begging puppy appeared again, and its expression mirrored the one that Wormon wore. Like I could say no to this... "Of course we can. As soon as we get these babies back to their home."

"Whoohooo!" The umbrella appeared again, and swung itself in a happy circle.

__

I think this is a good place to stop, don't you? *EG* Ahem....anyhow....Review, please! It'll make me so happy! I'll be posting the next part ASAP, as soon as it's written. Thanks again, Dem!


	3. The Search for Dementia

__

**Firstus**, I want to warn you that I might start getting confusing from here on in. If I do_, then just e-mail me (the_purple_schnoodle@yahoo.com) and I'll make sure to add some sort of explanation in. _

**Secondus**, I would like to make a small disclaimer (because I forgot it on the last part of the fic, though it is_ on the first chapter). *ahem* I do not now, nor ever have, nor ever, as far as I know, will own Digimon. The concept of the Diadem was made up by John Peel (a very cool author. Read his books!), but my friends and I have tweaked it quite a lot. The Chaos Lords & Co. are our characters, totally and completely. _

Now that that's over with, and I'm probably starting to annoy you people now...enjoy the next portion of Digital Chaos!

-~-

....ended up on Tatooine...that's where we found this boy...My, my...

"Dementia?"

...this here Anakin guy, maybe Vader some day later now- Yes?

"Is it really necessary to...uh...sing like that?"

Yes. -he's just a small fry. He left his home, he kissed his mommy good-bye saying "Soon I'm gonna be a Jedi. Soon I'm gonna be a Jedi."...

"Ho boy." Ken rubbed his temples. I could tell he was feeling a little stressed. Not that I could blame him. We'd been walking for hours, and we still hadn't found any sign of the people who were supposed to be looking for her. At least we'd been able to drop off all the babies...

Maybe if I could just get her to stop singing...she'd been at it non-stop ever since we left Primary Village. "Ahem...Dementia?"

Well I know he built C3PO, and I've heard how fast his pod can go, and we were-eh?

"Could you maybe tell us who we're looking for, exactly?"

Two transparent humans appeared beside us. One was a girl with blond hair that went past her shoulders. She was a couple inches taller than Ken and wore a dark, forest green tunic and pants, and had a even darker green cape. At her side hung a sword with a shiny gem in the hilt. The other was a brown haired girl, who was a little shorter than Ken. She was dressed in similar clothes, only hers were deep violet, with a dark purple cape. Above their heads flashed neon name tags. "Rahvin" said the one above the blond. "D'nea" said the brunette's.

Ken studied them. "They're dressed...oddly."

They disappeared, and Dementia replied immediately, It's the latest style on Chaos!

"We'll take your word for it."

-~-

Rahvin teleported us to the Digital World. After we got our bearings, and decided on a direction, I asked her to explain how she did it. 

"Teleportation, you mean?" she asked.

"Exactly."

She glanced at my Pineapple laptop, and raised an eyebrow. "Where I'm from, they're apples..." she muttered softly, then shrugged. "Teleportation is easy...once you get the hang of it. You always need a lot of concentration, because you could end up anywhere if you don't."

"How does it work, in the first place? Could one of _us_ learn how to do it?" It'd be a lot easier moving to and from the Digital World if we could, I added silently.

"If you had magic, maybe. It comes to me naturally, so I don't need a spell for it. But if, say, D'nea wanted to teleport, she'd need to find a spell. It involves changing yourself or, in the case of multiple teleportation, a group of people into thoughts."

That startled me. "Thoughts?"

"Of course. Nothing's faster than the speed of thought. And mind readers, or telepaths can sense other minds through walls, and across great distances. When you teleport, you have to know where you want to go and picture it in your mind. If teleportation is natural to you, you'll finish the spell naturally. If you need to use a spell out of a book, you'd picture the place and then say the spell."

"Prodigious..."

Tai, who was leading the group, called back to us. "Hey, Rahvin! We think we've found something!"

Rahvin hurried up to them, and groaned. They were gathered on the top of a hill. When I joined them, I immediately saw what they'd seen. A whole army of multi-colored mice, each armed with a small cocktail umbrella, stood at attention at the bottom of the hill.

One small, blue mouse stepped forward, and proclaimed in a shrill, squeaky voice,   
"Greetings, Lady Rahvin, Empress of Night, Queen of the Evening, Guardian of Fire, and Keeper of Spirit! We, the Mouse Minions of The Grand Carrot Killer, Dementia Moonstruck-"

"Borderline!" chimed the rest of the mice. "Borderline! Borderline!"

"-are searching for our Mistress. We wish to know if you, Lady Rahvin, have seen her?"

Rahvin, who was eyeing the mice with a frown, shook her head. "No. But I'm looking for her. If you find her first, tell her to contact me ASAP, alright?"

"Bummer." The mouse sighed, and then bowed. "If we have the fortune to find our Mistress first, we will most surely tell her of your message."

"By the way," Rahvin glared savagely at them. "You wouldn't happen to know which one of you little---_mice_---blew up my library last-"

The mouse suddenly looked panicky. "Uh, no! No, of course not. Terribly sorry, but we must be off now! Our Mistress may need us!"

The entire army disappeared in a tiny bursts of multicolored smoke.

"What was that all about?" Yolei asked, picking up a small umbrella that was left behind. It disappeared in her hand, and she gave an exclamation of surprise.

Rahvin winced dramatically. "Uh...those were some of Dementia's minions."

Matt stared at her, incredulous. "_Some_ of her minions?" 

"_Minions_?"

"Are you so sure that she needs our help?"

__

Cody answered before Rahvin could. "We promised we'd help Rahvin find her. She needs Dementia to find Enime, doesn't she?"

Rahvin nodded. "Exactly. And I want to know where Dementia is, in any case. It's always a good idea to know where she or her minions are." She scowled suddenly. "Crazy little umbrella wielding mice....if I ever catch that little squeaker I'll _refract him_."

We stared at her. Min offered, as an explanation, "Not that long ago, one of Dementia's mice minions got into Castle Chaos and destroyed part of Rahvin's library. She's _still _mad at the thing."

Thinking of my laptop, I realized I could sympathize.

Rahvin shrugged. "Whatever. Let's go."

-~-

After Rahvin and the others teleported, D'nea sat sulking. I could have handled the sulking, but the fact that she was sitting three feet in the air was a little disturbing. I was trying to think of some way to get her out of her blue funk, when Wizardmon suddenly did it for me. "Excuse me, D'nea..."

D'nea blinked, and looked down at him. 

"Could you give us a tour of this place?"

D'nea did a little twirl in the air, scanning the Great Hall, then shrugged. "Sure, why not." "Standing" up, floated a foot off the ground, and looked thoughtful. "I could show you my garden, but I'd better leave Rahvin and Ae'ros' rooms alone."

A few moments later, Davis, Kari, Gatomon, Wizardmon, D'nea and I were bundled into her elevator. As it started to move up, I realized with a start that not only the walls, but the floor and ceiling were made of glass (or at least, something that looked like it). I gulped, looking down. The ground was moving away very quickly, and there didn't seem to be a whole lot holding up the elevator. "Uh..."

D'nea glanced at me, and grinned. "Oh...that. Don't worry, it's never malfunctioned, and it's been running for centuries."

It didn't do much to reassure me, but I kept my mouth shut about it, and looked up instead. Wizardmon didn't help when he asked how the elevator worked, and D'nea started in with this long explanation about "mix of telekinesis and the makings of an Earth elevator." Soon, though, we reached solid, opaque ground again. We bundled out of the elevator and into a large, elaborate garden. "Just wait 'till we go back down." D'nea grinned, a little mischievously, and I got a little worried. 

My worries, however, were soon forgotten when D'nea started to lead us around her garden. She hundreds of different kinds of plants, a lot of which I'd seen before, and a lot which I could tell had never grown on Earth. A network of streams, fountains and waterfalls ducked and dodged around various plants, and I couldn't help thinking how Gomamon would have loved this place. _*Maybe the others can contact him for me. He'd never let me forget it if I left him out of all this.*_

In the middle of the garden was a large pool with a surface so calm it looked like it was made out of glass. "Sometimes I can scry with it," D'nea was explaining. 

"Could you find you friend Dementia in it?" Wizardmon wondered.

D'nea shrugged. "We tried earlier, and it gave us an earful. Something about 'disconnected number'. I wouldn't mind trying again. Maybe this time it'll give us a clue that we can pass on to the searchers." She knelt down next to the pool, and touched the surface with one finger. The water rippled away from her finger and, as it did, the water slowly turned white. "Pool..."

The water churned, and bubbled. A voice that reminded me of a waterfall snapped, "_What?!_"

D'nea rolled her eyes. "Chill out. Could you try looking for Dementia again, please? She'd be in the Digital World."

The water calmed for a moment, and then swirled. "That one that was a bunch of random pixels? The one who's mouse minion traumatized my sister, over in Rahvin's library? _That_ Dementia?"

The Chaos Lord winced. "Yeah, that'd be her."

The pool growled, and boiled. After a moment or two, it settled down and sighed. "Alright. Fine." Its surface rippled, and it went silent.

After a minute or so of silence, I caught D'nea's attention. "What's it doing?"

"Searching. Just be patient."

Just then the pool rippled again. "Found her. Or, part of her, anyway. At least, her minions." The pool twisted, and suddenly we could see a large forest. I recognized it from our travels in the Digital World. A volleyball, hovering in mid air, suddenly zoomed into view. It paused in its flight, soared upwards, bobbed back down and zoomed on. Behind it came a small troop of what looked like mice, only they carried small, paper cocktail umbrellas, and were all in colors of the rainbow. Above them, flew some small, humanoid looking beings, with transparent dragonfly wings. "Bob," D'nea commented. "The volleyball," she added, off of our confused looks. "The mice are hers, also the pixel pixies."

"The...what?" Davis blinked. 

"Pixel pixies. Smart of her to call some up, they'll be a big help getting her back together. Looks like she's not with this bunch, though." D'nea went silent and closed her eyes. Before we could start to get seriously worried, she opened them again. "I told Rahvin about them. She says she'll keep an eye out for them, and if her group runs into them maybe they'll tag along." 

-~-

Enime looked up from his spell books and glared at the small, pixie-like creatures that were swarming around his head. "Go _away_!" Mage lightning punctuated his words.The pixies giggled manically and began performing some complicated and sort of pretty synchronized flying moves. 

"_SHAIDOW!_"

The shape shifter materialized next to its master. "Yes, Master?"

Enime jabbed a finger at the pixies. "These are Dementia's minions."

"Yes, Master."

"And we got rid of Dementia."

"That is correct, Master."

"_THEN WHY ARE THESE HERE?!_"

Shaidow flinched. "I believe, Sire, that they're protesting the fact you scattered their Master...err...Mistress."

"Well, then, _get rid of them_." Enime snarled and turned back to the book. "I have to study the mental link the Chaos Lords have between them."

The shape shifter tried to peer over the mage's shoulder. "Why, Sire?"

"Because I believe I can..." He glanced up, and glared at the pixies. They all wore identical expressions of innocence. "Filthy little spies."

Behind the Logic mage's chair, a sixteen year old human boy stood stiff and silent. His eyes had a glazed, blank look and it was obvious he was not aware of his surroundings.

-~-

Being a handful of random pixels has a few definite down sides to it. The obvious one, of course, is not having a body. It seriously restricts your explosive carrying capabilities, and if you don't have explosives how can you fight the Carrots? And then there's the fact you can't actually _talk_. Only write out what you want to say with your own pixels. 

Still, it had a few perks. Two words: Special Effects. Mwa ha ha haaaa.

"Dementia...maybe it would be better if you didn't broadcast our location to anyone who might be nearby like that." 

I sent up another flare, just for the fun of it and "looked" at him. If I had eyes, I would have blinked. Which brought up a question: If I don't have ears, how could I hear? I decided I didn't care. What? Why not? 

Ken grimaced. "I'm not all that well liked around here." 

Aw, c'mon. Who could _not_ like you?

"You mean _besides_ you and Wormon? Everyone." 

Your parents must like you.

"Well...yeah. But they don't know what I've done..." 

So you were evil for awhile. Big woop-de-doo. Some people might consider me evil. I preened.  But they're usually the ones who have been hurting my friends. I added an evil looking smiley face after this.

"You're lucky to have friends."

Wormon hugged Ken's leg, "_I'll_ always be your friend, Ken."

Ken smiled down at him. "Thanks Wormon."

Suddenly, my dear, beloved Bob came zooming around a bend and, spotting me, darted over. He did a few loop-de-loops around my cluster of pixels and then did a volleyball victory dance in the air above Ken's head.

Both human and Digimon backed away quickly. "What's that?!"

It's Bob. One of my minions. I "turned" to Bob. Who's a good little minion? Whooo's a good little minion! Bob bobbed in happiness. 

Ken and Wormon exchanged looks. "O-kay." 

Bob! Have you found Rahvin and D'nea yet? Bob sunk lower in the air and looked as sad as a volleyball can. Don't worry! But, you must go find them! Fly, my pretty, fly! Fly!

He twirled in the air and zoomed away.

We watched as he grew smaller, and farther away. Ken looked at me. "Now what?"

Now we wait for Bob to find my friends.

-~-

Something collided with my back, and I yelped, spinning around and drawing my sword. Then I realized who (or, rather, what) it was and laughed. "Bob!" 

Tai and the rest stared. 

"It's a floating volleyball," Matt commented, bluntly. "A...floating volleyball."

"It's Bob. Dementia's head minion," I explained.

Bob did a series of twirls and bobs in the air, which made me think that perhaps he was trying to tell us something. "What is it...uh...boy? Have you found Dementia?"

The volleyball whizzed around frantically and zipped off the way it had come. I took that as a yes. "I think he's found her! If we just follow him, I think he'll lead us to her!"

"You _think_," Tai pointed out.

"Yes, well, talking to a volleyball takes a whole lot of interpretation. I'm not positive that's what he 'said.' I _do_ know that if we don't hurry up and follow him we're going to lose him and the one lead we've had all day. Will you come _on_?" Not waiting to see if they did, I jogged after the volleyball. When he'd realized we weren't following him, he'd stopped and performed some agitated little loop-de-loops. 

"We're coming, Bob. Just chill."

They jogged up a moment later, and we trooped out, following the floating volleyball.

-~-

Ken and I started to swap stories. I told him about my Carrot conquests, and he told me about soccer strategies and how they could be used in battle, etc. He made it very clear that he wasn't going to be using them in battle ever again, but I still found it an interesting topic.

Just as I was in the middle of the story of how I found this number to call if you'd like things blown up (A/N: This is actually another fic I'm writing...I'll post what I have of it after I've posted this one) when Bob came zooming back, with a group of kids who I didn't recognize being lead by someone I did. Azzie! I "called."

The brown, fuzzed up haired boy glanced at Rahvin. "Azzie?"

Rahvin shrugged a little. "Its my nickname. Short for Azalea, which is another nickname." He looked confused, so she shook her head. "Never mind."

She ran over to me and eyed my clusters of transparent pixels. "Dem?"

In the flesh...err...pixels. I created and narrowed a pair of eyes. Hey! Where's D'nea?

Rahvin ducked her head. "We thought it'd be a good idea if she stayed at Chaos."

What? Why?

Enime's poisoning her with his magic. 

_WHAT?! _I snarled as best I could without a mouth. Oooooh, he's gone too far this time. I'm gonna kill him. I'm gonna _kill_ him!!!

Rahvin suddenly clapped both hands over her ears and yelped in pain. "Aargh! D'nea! Lower the volume, lower the volume!" She got that "listening" look, then gasped. "_What?!_" She looked up at me. "I think you're going to get your chance. He's attacking the castle."

__

And I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to end this part here. Compliments? Complaints? Just tell me. :)


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